The Ruska Report
Just over a year ago in the Finnish wilderness, I found myself on a strange sojourn with a friend. With no wifi, electricity, or cafes nearby, mornings were reserved for slow awakenings and brewing coffee. The days were spent reading, picking berries, and studying the forests and lakes. Then of course, the evenings were reserved for the ever holy sauna. As memory serves...
Ruska (Finnish):
the browning or the turning of the leaves into autumn.
The journey out of Helsinki is a Wes Anderson plot. A four-hour train ride leads to an evening tea party at Grandmother’s. Her cups are enamelled black, gold rimmed, and made in the USSR. Borrowing her car, an equally antiquated piece of Cold War machinery, we stock supplies at a grocers populated by shoppers in 80s track suits. A ferryboat then takes us across sinister waters to a smattering of forested islands, strung together by the barest definition of bridges. Eventually, I find the dim headlamps eerily lighting up a wooden cabin overlooking a silent and sleeping lake. Exhausted, we build a fire and drink Portuguese wine until the embers draw us down into slumber.
Through the following mornings, I climb various crags and hills to improve my views. The first perception is utter silence, pure and eternal. But still my breathing, and I hear a rustling out of the West and carried over the ancient hills, relics of the Ice Age. The pines rise to greet that melody, while shy yellows sway and dance over the water. An occasional pike perch leaps out, spreading ripples of gold and blue. Ducks head south in formation, their squawks coming in faint. Above, an armada of clouds sail by to the tempo of a silent orchestra. I too find myself bound to the calm as the days stretch on. Conversations become hushed, sometimes whispered. Footsteps turn lighter and softened, careful so as not to crush the forest berries and flora. Eyes drift over the landscape, unaware of time, listening to the simple murmurs of the wilderness.
But of course, an old rowboat is perched on shore. So backpack stuffed with extra jumpers, scarves, and Karhu “bear beer,” we push off for an adventure. With each pull, the hull groans and the wooden oars creak with age. I notice that only a few houses dot the shoreline. I learn where the beaver lives. And which Isle de Ferocious Birds to avoid. In this land of a thousand lakes, “they keep connecting on forever, so if you don't remember your course, you'll never find your way home.” As the light dips behind the tree line, the shadows lengthen, the winds calm, and shores swirl down to lick the bow of our pirate ship. Back on dry land with the onset of early evenings, I am introduced to and survive, my first true Finnish sauna experience. The etymology is an ancient word for a steam bathhouse. “It's a sacred place of truth and equality,” I’m told. Plus, according to the Zenophobe's Guide to the Finns, it is also “a fact of life that the Finns don't function properly if they can't bathe in the sauna regularly.” So in the spirit of functioning properly…
The initial experience is comparable to an unholy nightmare of fire breathing steam demons. But resist the urge to run out screaming bloody murder and the human body surprisingly goes into auto-adjust mode. Later, it’s with body steaming in cold air that I fly off the sauna deck like a bat out of hell into the heart-crushing lake waters of early October Finland. The air explodes out of my lungs, blood soars to my brain, and life intensifies. I’m addicted. For a few moments between sauna and hypothermia, I float on my back. The Milky Way blazes, and I sense the immensity of the world in which we exist. Gasping for breath in the cold, I’m a humbled observer to the silent theatre above. A childish urge takes over and I raise a hand in a wave to the distant voyagers of our grand galaxy before retreating back into the heat of the sauna.
Whilst the days flow into a cycle of adventure, rest and sauna, we run out of drinking water. A solution is presented by the resident Finn: “we have rainwater,” she cheerfully intones. “It's straight from the sky, naturally filtered. So no fish pee.” It’s mellow, silky and lightly sweet. We make coffee with it and boil eggs for breakfast. Lingonberry porridge. Buttered rye bread. Gin tonics in the afternoon with foraged berries. Stoking the fire in the sauna. And so, a week passes far too quickly and in a blink, the brutal ferry engines are tugging us back into civilization. As the shoreline of the lake islands recede into the distance, I tell myself I'm on to new voyages and stories. But I, a nostalgic, suspect this place will haunt me for years to come - the silvered blue of a forest lake, warm wool and the sharp scent of red pine; the peaceful company of fellow dreamers; and losing hours sipping whisky in the warmth of a fire.
